


Waking

by sasha_b



Category: Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-17
Updated: 2012-01-17
Packaged: 2017-10-29 16:41:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 810
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/321974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasha_b/pseuds/sasha_b
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shane discovers a truth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waking

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers up to season two episode _Secrets_.

Shane walks.

The woods are comforting, no matter the possibility of walkers hiding in the green that is so dissident in the middle of blood and gore. He shoves through the brush, a bit violently, hand on his gun, his back aching. He realizes he's got a bruise forming below his sciatic nerve; he must have banged it on the gearshift when he and Andrea...

He laughs. She'd grabbed his crotch and he'd said "come on, then," and boy howdy, had she. Shane's not sorry; on the contrary, she's a pretty girl if damaged. But they all are, really. Pretty and damaged. They might not be bit, but they're all rotting.

A branch slaps him across the face and he curses and spits, hating the fact he's so easily distracted. Distracted by what he'd said to Dale after he and Andrea had come back to the camp. Distracted by the thoughts that have been whirling since then.

 _I love him. He's my brother._

A declaration of truth; Shane's truth. He loves Rick's family, loves the boy Carl like he's Shane's own. Loves Lori and her hurt and her half smile and her skinny ass and her eyes that still sparkle even though there's nothing left to live for in this shit world.

He loves Rick. He loves Lori.

He spits again.

He'd do whatever Rick asked, whatever Rick wanted from him. He'd maim and cheat and lie and kill to help -

Shane stops, wavering a bit at the edge of a cliff. He can hear water rushing and the wind blows through the tops of the foliage, ruffling his clothing and ghosting over his head, the too short hair making him feel bald and weird. His hair had always been a lady-draw, and now...he rubs at the tear in his skin where Otis had snagged his scalp with desperate clutching fingers, the other man's leg shot through, the walkers scrambling and shuffling and screaming toward him.

He'd kill to protect Rick and what belonged to Rick. He already has, more than once.

He laughs and scrubs his hand over his sweaty face, the big nose feeling swollen and hot under his dirty fingers. He drops the hand to his gun again where it hangs at his left hip, even with his crotch and the flesh his khaki pants cover.

 _She'd put her hand straight on his cock._

Sunlight, dappled and disparate and too pretty for this world, touches the top of his head and warms his skin beneath the black tshirt he wears. He leans slowly against the tree to his left, the oak bark scratchy and scraping his arm - he rubs it back and forth against the rough wood, the skin breaking as he abrades his arm and watches the blood flow and merely blinks into the sunlight, the small pain he feels nothing in comparison to the utter hopelessness that the realization of his reality brings. He loves Rick and everything Rick is, and that will be his ending, because while Rick loves him, he loves his family more.

That's only right, Shane thinks. There is no room for Lancelot in the Arthur story. Even he knows how that legend ends. Triangles are not good shapes, not for him and not for anyone he loves.

He swallows and stops scratching his arm on the tree. The blood flow is sluggish and he snaps to his current whereabouts, knowing abrading his skin is stupid and rash and could bring walkers just by the scent. He turns and forces himself to walk back toward the camp, anger at his situation a burning bile fire at the back of his throat, the crackling of it flame and tinder all in one.

Dale had best stay out of his way, god damn stupid old man.

When Rick stops him and lifts his arm later that day, murmuring concern over the crusted blood and cut, Shane merely smiles cryptically and forces Rick to _let go, man, I'm fine._ He brushes past Lori and Carl, who is waving his arms as he describes to his mother the shooting he's done that day (Shane can't help the grin that blossoms from that; he's so proud of the boy) and finds a spot in the grass that's quiet, where he can shut his eyes and stop his thinking and let his arm stop bleeding.

He sees the blankness in Rick's eyes and the redness that rims Lori's, can almost smell the hurt and awkwardness rolling off of both of them, and wonders briefly what in the hell is going on with them. He cracks his eyes open, and watches the two of them move around each other as they fix dinner, stiff and strange even as Rick accidentally brushes Lori's hip as he moves past her.

He closes his eyes when they start to burn.


End file.
